Hell in a Handcart

Daniela Kapitá?ová Samko Tále’s Cemetery Book Trans. Julia Sherwood 130pp Garnett Press London 2010 Hardback £8.99 (Video from the launch in London on 11.1.2011) Samko Tále is a physically and mentally stunted, forty-three-year-old resident of the Slovak border town of Komárno, who supplements his disability pension by collecting cardboard, and is writing his ‘book about a cemetery’ because an alcoholic at the station pub predicted it. His eddying ‘stream-of-consciousness’ takes in the period from his grandmother’s wartime acquisition of Jewish property (‘why would Jews need things like a piano in a concentration camp, right?’), the Communist period and post-independence Slovakia. […]

K & K Gloom

  Having written of Kaiserlich und Königlich ennui a little while ago, I would now like to write of sadness, melancholy, spleen or – to invoke the official language of one half of the Empire – Weltschmerz. Not far from the Serenissima’’s borders, where the Austro-Hungarian coast came to an end, Maria Theresa was gripped by the desire for her own Venice: a large, multicultural port with picturesque canals. And since the Austrian Empress approached every task in an orderly and systematic fashion, after issuing toleration edicts abolishing customs duties to attract settlers (adherents of a variety of faiths but of a single, mercantile […]

Neprehliadnite: V Rusku môže vypuknúť etnická vojna

Gazeta Wyborcza (Poľsko), 25.11.2011 Určite sa ozvú hlasy, že za atentátom sú naše tajné služby. No ja odmietam konšpiračné teórie. Nazdávam sa, že kaukazské podzemie bolo schopné zorganizovať takýto atentát, hovorí Vadim Dubnov, komentátor Rádia Sloboda, špecialista na tematiku Kaukazu a terorizmu korešpondentovi Gazety Marcinovi Wojciechowskému. O čom svedčí atentát na letisku Domodedovo? O tom, že kaukazské ozbrojené podzemie v Rusku vôbec neutrpelo porážku, ako tak často tvrdí naša vláda. Od posledného atentátu v moskovskom metre uplynul necelý rok. Ak kaukazské podzemie skutočne utrpelo porážku, nedokázalo by sa tak rýchlo pripraviť na atentát takýchto rozmerov. Odkiaľ viete, že je to kaukazské podzemie? Kto […]

Niečo sa zmenilo / Stĺpček

Vo chvíli, keď píšem tieto riadky, niekoľko hodín po výbuchu, ešte presne nevieme, kto spáchal atentát na moskovskom letisku Domodedovo. Vieme nasledovné: V Rusku sa dačo sa zmenilo. Ruský prezident Dimitrij Medvedev už predniesol príhovor v televízii, kondoloval obetiam a odložil cestu do Švajčiarska, kde má vystúpiť na konferencii v Davose. Kedysi trvalo oveľa dlhšie, kým ruské vedenie zareagovalo na katastrofy. Bývalý sovietsky generálny tajomník Michail Gorbačov roku 1986 čakal tri týždne, kým sa vyjadril k Černobyľskej katastrofe. Bývalý prezident Vladimír Putin roku 2000 čakal päť dní, kým zareagoval na katastrofu ponorky Kursk. V Rusku si z niektorých skúseností vzali ponaučenie. Ruské ministerstvo zdravotníctva spustilo horúcu […]

From crisis to crisis

Crisis. For the past eighteen months this word has brought to mind mostly one thing: the financial crisis triggered by the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the shockwaves it has sent throughout the world leaving no country unaffected, including Hungary. While every effort is being made to avoid further risk on the global scale, Hungary – a country with a fragile economy – has started losing foreign investors and their financial trust. Ever since the crisis began in 2008 its moral aspects have been the subject of an intense debate, particularly the fact that the real cause of the crisis is what […]

Democracy or What You Will

A wonderful thing has happened. Last Thursday, on the day of Epiphany, Hungary took over the presidency of the European Union. I am a humble citizen of the union and I am Hungarian so this sounded like a good reason to order champagne, do the hula and start jumping up and down for joy.Epiphany means revelation and it refers to the twelfth day of the search party of the Three Wise Men, who following a star, on this very day caught sight of our Lord, aka baby Jesus and showered him with gifts. On this day, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor […]

Taking Stock

Barely eight months have passed since the new parliament was formed – and since then the words and deeds of the party and government new in power have turned the political life and the workings of the state and the economy upside down. We keep being perplexed; we have not even woken up from the astonishment caused by a political step yesterday when shocked by another new announcement or measure today. It is difficult to absorb the whirlwind of events. Let us stop for a moment, let us take a deep breath, and let us re-consider what has actually happened. […]